OT: Round of applause for Paul Allen

BNB said:

You said the flu is more of a threat and he should have donated to that, after saying "more hysteria."

I was just pointing out that there is a TON more hysteria coming from the CDC about the flu and the death toll isn't nearly as high as they say it is. Plus, to donate to that cause [if the flu even has a cause] would be kind of pointless because the flu causes complications in high risk patients. If you are healthy, the flu is not a threat to you. If you have a compromised immune system, everything is a threat to you. A minor infection can turn into a huge infection that spreads throughout your body and kill you.

A lot of people are actually dying FROM ebola and will continue dying from it. The CDC or anyone else for that matter can't even prove how many people die from the flu.

I guess I was pretty much trying to say that the flu was a bad example maybe?


And to quote what you had originally posted



the ebola virus probably could mutate as well which could make a potential vaccine useless. In which case, that money can be used to improve medical care in high risk areas. Not everyone that gets ebola dies. In fact, if it's caught early enough, a good percentage of people can live. In same instances, as low as 25% people died in a breakout. In Africa and other poor areas, their medical care is shit and that's the biggest reason why people are dying. With the flu, a lot of people that get complications from it have chronic illnesses such as some autoimmune diseases, cancer, etc. So they shouldn't be using money for a flu vaccine or cure, they should use the money for autoimmune disease treatments, etc. If those people become healthier, then the flu becomes less of a risk to them. As does everything else. A vaccine for Ebola may not be entirely effective because it IS a virus and can mutate. So the money can be used to improve treatments and medical care so getting over ebola could be easier and perhaps like a nuisance instead of a deadly disease.

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Sigh.

Not sure where I said we should ignore ebola. But ok.

Not really sure what you are getting on about. Its a real thing that people are hysterical about ebola in the us. Thats not saying it isn't a serious issue that needs to be dealt with.

BNB said:

Idk why he chose to spend so much for this cause. But Idc either. I just thought it was pretty cool that he cared enough to make a potentially big difference in thousands [potentially a lot more] of lives.

do I think other diseases deserve more attention? Of course. But it's not my money and I'm not gonna complain about a guy trying to do good with his own money.

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Sure, and as I said in my original post, the generosity should be commended. I just think that the media causes this hysteria for ratings, that even someone as smart as Paul Allen is not immune to.

I just picture this:

If two men sat across the table from Paul Allen and he said, "guys, I have got $100M burning a hole in my pocket. If i gave it to you, what would you do with it?"

Man #1: Well there is this virus, ebola, that pops up every so often since 1976, it has been known to kill around 6000 over those 38 years. It's scary as hell with blood coming from your eyes and shit. I would try and find a cure for that.

Man#2 You know malaria has killed over 20,000,000 during that same time span and will kill half a million this year. We have treatment that I would like to make more available.

Paul Allen: Bleeding eyes,huh? I also saw something about ebola and zombies, I will not stand for that crazy shit.


and wish maybe if he felt this urge to give he would save so many more with that money. Think about those #'s. It is nearly as absurd as my extreme example.

But again, it's his money and at least it is going to do some good.

"Not everyone that gets ebola dies. In fact, if it's caught early enough, a good percentage of people can live. In same instances, as low as 25% people died in a breakout. "

In regards to this fact, I dont know if I call 1 out of four dying a good percentage.. Thats terrible to hear imo if you are sitting on the other side of an ebola diagnosis..

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botfly10 said:

Sigh.

Not sure where I said we should ignore ebola. But ok.

Not really sure what you are getting on about. Its a real thing that people are hysterical about ebola in the us. Thats not saying it isn't a serious issue that needs to be dealt with.

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I didn't indicate that you said we should ignore ebola.

You just brought up hysteria, then followed it up with the flu. And I was just saying that there is probably a lot more hysteria surrounding the flu ESPECIALLY since it isn't even that deadly. That's pretty much it.

iueyedoc said:

Sure, and as I said in my original post, the generosity should be commended. I just think that the media causes this hysteria for ratings, that even someone as smart as Paul Allen is not immune to.

I just picture this:

If two men sat across the table from Paul Allen and he said, "guys, I have got $100M burning a hole in my pocket. If i gave it to you, what would you do with it?"

Man #1: Well there is this virus, ebola, that pops up every so often since 1976, it has been known to kill around 6000 over those 38 years. It's scary as hell with blood coming from your eyes and shit. I would try and find a cure for that.

Man#2 You know malaria has killed over 20,000,000 during that same time span and will kill half a million this year. We have treatment that I would like to make more available.

Paul Allen: Bleeding eyes,huh? I also saw something about ebola and zombies, I will not stand for that crazy shit.


and wish maybe if he felt this urge to give he would save so many more with that money. Think about those #'s. It is nearly as absurd as my extreme example.

But again, it's his money and at least it is going to do some good.

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I agree 100% that making treatment for malaria widely available would be better in the grand scheme of things.

Your last sentence though is where I'm at. At least he did something good with his money, and I thought it was a nice gesture.

vincentvega said:

"Not everyone that gets ebola dies. In fact, if it's caught early enough, a good percentage of people can live. In same instances, as low as 25% people died in a breakout. "

In regards to this fact, I dont know if I call 1 out of four dying a good percentage.. Thats terrible to hear imo if you are sitting on the other side of an ebola diagnosis..

Sent from my DROID2 using Tapatalk 2

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The goal would be to reduce the number. On average, 50% of people that get ebola will die. With proper care, that number would be much lower.

BNB said:

Where did bot imply "LIKE the flu"?

And idk how many people die from the flu. There are a bunch of studies though that show that the CDC compiles their numbers terribly. They mark down some people that die from pneumonia as a "flu death" but they don't even know if that person ever had the flu. There are like 30 different causes of pneumonia. It should not be assumed that the person had the flu at the time of their death. That's really lazy by the CDC.

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So Ebola total death count in 2014 > the flu? Even adjusting for "inflated" math?

Jamais Vu said:

I love Bill Burr.

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Lol in the same Podcast he ripped on the Lions and Packers. He was watching the Packers-Panthers game while doing the podcast. Mid-way through the podcast he just randomly goes, "Is every single Packer fan fat as fuck? I don't think there's one treadmill in that entire state."

SmellyFoot said:

So Ebola total death count in 2014 > the flu? Even adjusting for "inflated" math?

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I don't know what the total death count for the flu is. Neither does the CDC because most of the people that they count in their stats weren't even tested for a flu virus. They just group pneumonia related deaths with flu related deaths because pneumonia can be linked with the flu in some instances. But again, 30 different things can cause pneumonia. And in that one study I posted, they found that only 18 people were positively identified to have the flu in 2001. But the CDC said that there were over 61,000 related "influenza and pneumonia" related deaths that year. So why do they want to make it seem like so many people die from the flu? The answer is pretty obvious. Flu shots make a lot of money, and no one is gonna get the flu shot if they knew not many people actually died from the flu. But people sure are scared of getting the flue.

If you got the flu, how scared would you be of dying?

If you got ebola, how scared would you be of dying? And if hypothetically ebola started spreading throughout the world and the US, would you be more scared of getting ebola than the flu?

And again, Ebola is serious no matter who gets it. The flu CAN be serious to people with compromised immune systems. But to those people, everything can be serious. A simple infection that healthy people get over quickly can kill a chronically ill person.

Just to make this thread Bears relevant and plug Marshall...

How about putting this money in research and treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder ? I mean...lifetime prevalence of about 5-6% in the US, a lot of them (up to 10% of some clinical groups) will die by suicide and the emotional/financial costs on the society are insane. Yet:

"Borderline personality disorder remains far behind other major psychiatric disorders in awareness and research. The difference between its reported prevalences in clinical settings (15%–25%) (28) and in the community (1.4%–5.9%) (101, 102) indicates that a large number of people with the disorder are undiagnosed and untreated. Research on the disorder receives a total of only about $6 million annually in NIMH funds, less than 2% of the amount allocated to research on schizophrenia (which has a prevalence of 0.4%) (103) and less than 6% of that for bipolar disorder (which has a prevalence of 1.6%)" (Gunderson - that's Marshall's doc, 2011)

So - the NIMH spends 6 milion and Brandon Marshall 1 million from his paycheck. Cool.

Who knows, maybe some of the NFL players could ultimately benefit too.

The expression "flu-like" symptoms is a standard medical term. Tracing a respiratory disease to one of the many flu viruses (there is not only one) requires costly immunological tests that have little point in the treatment so it is entirely possible that deaths caused by flu viruses are not "officially" traced to a flu-virus but clinically diagnosed as "flu-like respiratory disease".

Spartan said:

I do know the cure to ebola. If anyone here gets it just PM me and I'll give it to you.

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Let me guess. The ebola vaccine?

jk, I had to. I know others held back. I couldn't help it.

I think Allen gives away a lot. This donation is just headlining. Heck, Bill Gates, his good buddy, gave what, like $70 billion total to AIDS/HIV over his lifetime?

Kudos.

Probably the loose change in his couch. A very generous donation by Mr. Allen.

BNB said:

the ebola virus probably could mutate as well which could make a potential vaccine useless. In which case, that money can be used to improve medical care in high risk areas. Not everyone that gets ebola dies. In fact, if it's caught early enough, a good percentage of people can live. In same instances, as low as 25% people died in a breakout. In Africa and other poor areas, their medical care is shit and that's the biggest reason why people are dying. With the flu, a lot of people that get complications from it have chronic illnesses such as some autoimmune diseases, cancer, etc. So they shouldn't be using money for a flu vaccine or cure, they should use the money for autoimmune disease treatments, etc. If those people become healthier, then the flu becomes less of a risk to them. As does everything else. A vaccine for Ebola may not be entirely effective because it IS a virus and can mutate. So the money can be used to improve treatments and medical care so getting over ebola could be easier and perhaps like a nuisance instead of a deadly disease.

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That's not probably, the virus is mutating. Just like every virus, bacterias, fungi, etc. The humans are mutating as well, the only difference is how quickly are they are reproducing and therefore mutating. Not so fun fact about ebola, during the first epidemic in the 70's the virus was killing about 90% of the people infected versus around 50% today. The virus is less deadly today but can spread around more easily because of more people surviving it.
Going back to treatment and vaccination you're right, if a vaccine is found, use and then the virus mutates in a way that he can escape the immune response induce by the vaccination, the said vaccine would become useless against that virus, but the same thing can be said about any hypothetical treatment. You can't put all your eggs in the same basket. That's why in the the HIV/AIDS treatment they're using a tritherapy, three different antiviral drugs to reduce the probability of developing resistance by the virus. It's effective but the only way to really "beat" the virus is by preventing it to spread.
Same thing with ebola, a treatment would be great no doubt, so would be a vaccine, but the greatest thing would be a combination of both and an improvement in hygiene to reduce the spreading.

Same principle with the flu, the vaccine is useful even if only about 50% effective because it reduce the number of virus carrier and therefore protect people at risk from having it. I don't really know the guidelines about flu vaccination in the US, but here in Europe we try to vaccinate : 1) The people at risk who can be vaccinate and 2) The people close to the ones at risk (family, doctors, nurses etc...). By doing that you protect people from being in contact with the virus and from contracting the virus (at least you decrease the chance, there is no such things as 100% in medicine).
Regarding pneumonia, even though there is a lot of possible agent for it, it's well documented that the flu increase the chance of having pneumococcal pneumonia and the chance of dying by it ("The flu makes the bed for the pneumococcal").

I'm of mixed feelings on this.

Ebola is front and center, but considerably less deadly that all forms of cancer, the flu, etc. If we take that to other countries, we have other concerns - AIDS, malaria, etc.

So, obviously, giving $100M is fantastic, but the question is valid - is this the right war to be fighting with that kind of money.

The other question is who gets the money and distributes it? If it was donated directly the federal govt or the CDC or that new lackey hack 'czar', I'm sure it will be pissed away.

But I've seen many of the 'hey, Microsoft finally does something about a deadly virus'

Jamais Vu said:

I love Bill Burr.

That said, Ebola is being blown out of proportion in this country. In west Africa it is becoming a full blown epidemic...so they money can still go to very good use.

Think globally.

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And AIDS and malaria are still bigger concerns.

FatBabiesHaveNoPride said:

And AIDS and malaria are still bigger concerns.

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I like the fact that he made the investment, but over 700 million people die of starvation every year. All together Ebola, flu, aids, and malaria don't come anywhere close to that number.

As far as having the bigger bang for the investment buck, if Allen's primary desire was to save the most lives, investing in the effort to help end hunger would be the better cause to support.

It's not my money though and I cannot find fault in his gesture.

Who the fuck complains about someone donating to a deserving cause? Who are you to question what he donates to or why? Who is to say he hasn't donated to other deserving causes? Paul Allen deserves major kudos no matter how you look at it.

Paul Allen has given more than $1.8 billion towards the advancement of science, technology, education, wildlife conservation, the arts and community services in his lifetime. In 2010, Allen became a signatory of The Giving Pledge, promising to give at least half of his fortune to philanthropic causes. In February, The Chronicle of Philanthropy 2014 named Allen as no. 11 on a list of the 50 most generous donors in 2014; Allen’s direct giving in 2014 totaled $206 million. In 2014 Paul Allen pledged to donate at least $100 million dollars to help combat Ebola in the United States and in other affected countries.[28] Allen's foundation previously pledged $26.5 million.

While I get the point trying to be made, I think it's a bit nitpicky given the above.

Further, Paul Allen is not being swayed by the media. He is being swayed by the science and pathology of the disease. Infect the same number of people with Ebola and the Flu, and the former will result in a shit ton more deaths than the latter. That is what Scientists and Paul Allen are reacting to. Scientist have always been concerned about virulent diseases and the only reason Ebola hasn't killed more is geography ie it has broken out in relatively sparsely populated areas. You unleash Ebola in a large city and you would likely see death rates to rival the plague which is why people want to find a cure. It's that potential that scares people not the current reality of how many people it has killed.

Why exactly are we worrying about saving people when the world is already overcrowded? Compassion will be the undoing of humanity. In fact, of it wasn't for the idiots rushing into ebola hot spots to do "god's work" we wouldn't have ebola in the US.